


Do Over

by JCapasso



Category: Haven (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-27
Updated: 2020-11-29
Packaged: 2021-03-10 02:48:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 22,550
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27737161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JCapasso/pseuds/JCapasso
Summary: After a group of troubles combine to blast Haven off the map, Audrey is determined to fix it...somehow. Thankfully Charlotte provides her with a way. A prototype device from their world that will take Audrey back to the moment she met her soulmate.
Relationships: Duke Crocker/Audrey Parker
Comments: 2
Kudos: 11





	1. Chapter 1

Audrey looked at the devastation around her in horror. It was over. All of it. She had failed. They had all failed. Haven was gone. Even the handful of survivors that she and Charlotte had spent the day pulling from the rubble didn’t make her feel any better. The fact that there were so few just made it even worse. Once they could be relatively certain that they’d saved as many as they could, Audrey just collapsed on the nearest pile and let her tears fall. 

Charlotte came and sat next to her. “I’m sorry,” she said sympathetically, trying to put her own pain aside to help her daughter. She may have lost the man that she might just have been falling in love with, but her daughter had lost everything. 

“How do I go on now?” Audrey asked desperately, allowing herself to take comfort in the arms of her almost mother which was the closest she’d ever had. 

“Why don’t we go home. I’ll show you around our world. You can build a new life there,” Charlotte suggested. She’d tried to convince Audrey to come home before, but she had still been fighting so hard to save this town. Now that it was over, that a combination of three different troubles had destroyed it all, maybe she would have more luck. 

“/This/ is my home,” she said harshly. 

“I know sweetie, but…there’s not really much left…”

“Then I’ll fix it,” Audrey said seriously, wiping her tears as she pulled from the embrace. “Even if I have to rebuild it alone, brick by brick. I can’t bring back the people, but I can honor them at least.” She took a few deep breaths as she set her decision in stone. “No, I will not rest until Haven is a quiet peaceful little town again. And the world knows of the lives lost here.”

Charlotte sighed and told her, “It might not come to that.” She hadn’t wanted to do this, but she couldn’t just watch her daughter suffer like this, and if Audrey wasn’t going to give up on this crazy idea, then it was her job as her mother to make sure that she had the tools to succeed as best as possible. Of course, her idea was just as crazy, but at least it could work. In theory. “Let’s go find the rubble of my lab. There’s something there that might help us.” 

“What is it?” Audrey asked hopefully. 

“I would rather not say right now. Not until we know whether or not it survived intact. I’d rather not get your hopes up if it didn’t,” Charlotte admitted, knowing that Audrey would understand, and if not, at least she was warned. 

“Okay. I guess I get that,” Audrey sighed. She would rather not get her hopes up either. She wasn’t sure how much more she could take today. Actually it was probably closer to two days since they’d heard the explosions and seen the smoke all the way from Kick Em Jenny Neck where they were looking for any remnants of the old barn to study and then they rushed back. Neither of them had eaten or slept in that time, too busy trying to find any and all survivors. Everything was a blur to her since Nathan and Duke were among the first of the bodies she found. The walk to the lab was spent in silence, only adrenaline keeping her feet moving. 

They spent a little over an hour digging through the rubble before Charlotte came up with a small handheld device and started scrutinizing it. “It looks intact,” she said relieved before turning back to the rubble, putting that one in her pocket.

“Now what are we looking for?” Audrey asked, joining in to help. 

“My flash drives with all my research,” she explained. “If you’re going back it can only help.”

“Back? Back where?” Audrey asked worriedly. Was this still about taking her back to that other world?

“This device is…a prototype for lack of a better word. Something that I had been working on years ago, but then the project was shut down and it was banned. For good reason. I keep it with me as a reminder of how sometimes, even with the best of intentions, we can sometimes go too far,” Charlotte told her. She wanted her to at least get how serious this was before she did it. 

“What does it do? And why was it banned?” 

“Technically, it was only banned on our world. This world is a bit of a grey area on that. I could never use it because it would take me back to our world, but you…you’d be staying here…if it works of course.”

“If /what/ works,” Audrey asked impatiently as they continued to dig through looking for her drives. 

“The purpose of the project was to help people find their soulmates, but it didn’t work out that way. It turned out that the connection between soulmates can’t be predicted. It can only be perceived once that connection forms, so what it actually /does/ is take you back to the time that you first met your soulmate,” Charlotte explained. 

“So it’ll take me back to when I first met Nathan?” she asked hopefully. “I can fix all this before it starts?” 

“Assuming Nathan and you are soulmates, yes,” Charlotte nodded. 

“What will happen if we aren’t?” Audrey asked. Not that she was going to back out no matter how bad it was. This kind of opportunity couldn’t be passed up. 

“If you’ve already met your soulmate, then it will take you to your soulmate no matter who it is. If you haven’t, then it just won’t work. You’ll stay here,” Charlotte told her. 

“Okay, but…what about the original Audrey Parker? The one whose thoughts and memories I have. Are you sure that it wouldn’t send me back to the moment that she met /her/ soulmate? Or Mara’s for that matter?” 

“I’m sure,” Charlotte told her. “The thoughts and memories from the original Audrey Parker are just that. Thoughts and memories. They don’t affect your soul. I know that it’s not something that this world is advanced enough to have found ways to perceive, so you’re going to have to take my word for it. As far as Mara, she’s not a part of you anymore. /You/ are now the dominant personality and it is /your/ soul that will be measured.” 

“But if Mara was the dominant personality when we met, would this bond have even formed the same way?” Audrey asked. 

Charlotte paused to consider that. “That’s a good question. I’m almost certain that it would have, but only almost. I suppose if I’m wrong, then it would send you back to the first time you saw him after the merge.”

“Which /might/ still be soon enough to prevent this,” Audrey nodded as she tried to consider any other questions she would need to know before doing this. “Okay, so would there be two of me or would I replace that version? If so, wouldn’t people notice my clothes and hair and whatever else changed?”

“No. It would send you back to your body just as you were then. The only difference will be that the travel device will remain in your hand when you get there since it has to connect to your soul to work, it remains with it.”

“Then why are we looking for the drives?” Audrey asked just as Charlotte found them. “I mean, if I can’t take them with me…”

“You can,” Charlotte told her as she started breaking them open and pulling out small chips from inside them. She had disguised the superior data storage methods of her world as the more primitive ones here. “Watch,” she told Audrey as she slid out a panel on the device and slipped the tiny chips inside. “There. Now they go too.”

“Okay,” she sighed in relief. “So I just go back, follow the timeline, and then go into the barn and avoid letting it be destroyed like should have happened the first time.” It would be even easier than last time. Now that she knew first hand the consequences, there was no way she could ever /not/ go. 

Charlotte decided not to give her hope that may be unfounded so didn’t tell her that it might not be necessary. She couldn’t even be positive that her past self would continue and finish her research, and even if she did, if it would be in time to prevent Audrey from going into the barn, so she didn’t mention it. “If that’s how you want to do it, yes.” 

“What about changing the past?” Audrey asked worriedly. 

“That is the biggest reason that the device was banned on our world, and not something to be taken lightly, but given that preserving the timeline will lead to this…” she motioned the destruction around them. “I don’t see much point in worrying about it. And since it’s only a few years and your time was only spent in this town, I don’t see any reason that you can’t change what you see fit. I would be careful who you tell about this though. Make sure they are trustworthy and consider what they might do differently if they know too.”

“Yeah. Okay. That makes sense,” she nodded as she started turning the idea over in her mind. She thought back to when she first met Nathan. How rigid he was. Unable or unwilling to open his mind. She wouldn’t be able to tell him right away. He would just write her off as insane. She would have to wait until his mind opened a little bit before she could tell him. Duke…Duke she would have to play by ear. Partially because she would be different with him this time. She knew him better now. Understood him. She wouldn’t be suspicious of his motives all the time and pushing him to try and figure him out and she had no idea how that might change his interactions with her too. Should she tell Garland? He knew all about the troubles and everything and he would probably believe her, but they had never been particularly close. He’d always kept his distance from her. Kept her at arm’s length. Would this change that? Would it even matter? She decided to play that one by ear too. If it became important that he know she would tell him, but otherwise not. Same with Vince and Dave. 

Charlotte could see Audrey’s wheels turning, but still needed to tell her a few more things. “One person you’re going to have to tell is Howard. Don’t tell him any of this over the phone. He won’t want to meet with you. He’s programmed to keep his distance unless needed, but tell him you have orders from me. If he doesn’t believe you, tell him you want to talk about Mara. That will get him to meet you. You need to give him this device and tell him about the drives inside and tell him that I said he has to get it to me as soon as possible. Once he sees it he’ll know you’re from the future and he’ll also know that I would never have given this to you unless the situation were dire.” 

“Okay. I’ll do that as soon as I can,” Audrey promised. 

“Okay. Then here. When you’re ready, turn this knob and then pull it open. Press and hold the button inside, and that’s it,” Charlotte told her before pulling her into a hug. “Good luck, Audrey.” 

“Thanks…mom,” she said with a hesitant smile as she hugged her back. If ever the woman deserved that level of acceptance it was now. Audrey knew that she could sit here all day analyzing possible scenarios and making plans, but it wouldn’t do any good. For one thing, it had been so long ago and so much had happened since then that she couldn’t possibly remember everything enough to do so. It would just be putting off the inevitable. She needed to get there and plan as she went. She took a few deep breaths to steady herself before activating the device.


	2. Chapter 2

Audrey stumbled as she found herself changing position and just barely managed not to react overtly to where she found herself as she saw the newspaper lowering to reveal Duke as he said, “Good morning.” Duke was her soulmate. She realized that some part of her wasn’t actually surprised. Somewhere deep down she had known that. She had just convinced herself that it was Nathan. But if Duke was her soulmate then why had he pushed her away. No, that was something to consider when she had time. Apparently she’d been silent too long because then he was responding to what she had apparently just said before she got here. “And I /laundered/ your clothes. And I saved your life. That’s an odd combination when you think about it. I mean, /if/ you think about it.” 

That was right. She’d accused him of taking her clothes. “You must be Duke,” she said, wanting to get that part out of the way as she lowered her gun and slid the device into the shirt pocket so she had a free hand for the coffee he was bringing her. 

“Milk. One sugar. Right?” he asked smugly. 

“No, and how would you know how I take my coffee?” she asked trying to tamp down her amusement. 

“No, I wouldn’t. But it would have been cool if I did,” he replied. 

Audrey could see right through him now. He was trying to break the ice and put her more at ease. She did what she should have done last time, and after taking the coffee said, “Maybe. But for future reference…I drink it black, no sugar…and thank you.” 

“You’re…welcome,” Duke said half-confused. He hadn’t been expecting sincere thanks. “I made breakfast too if you’re hungry?” 

“How about you turn around over there while I get dressed and then we’ll talk about coffee and breakfast,” she said amusedly while she tried to wrack her brain over how this conversation went last time. She knew that there was information she needed from him which had been why she had been here in the first place. She just had to remember the right questions to ask. Just like last time, she noticed him peeking as she changed and just like last time, she didn’t call him on it. It wasn’t like he hadn’t seen so much more last night. “You know Jonas Lester?” She finally remembered. 

“I know he’s dead, and uh…yeah that’s it. Dead,” Duke told her. He had been thrown off by the thanks, but now he knew for sure that she had been waiting for him last night. Probably to question him about it. And she guessed who he was. That meant that someone had been telling her stories about him which meant that she should know that he wasn’t one of the good guys. Maybe she was just /that/ polite. That had to be it. 

“Might want to rethink your answer,” Audrey held back her chuckle. She couldn’t remember what all he knew, but she knew there was more than that. 

“Really?” Duke asked with a smirk, glancing back again as she was pulling her clothes on. 

“Yeah, your gun was found where he died,” she pointed out, knowing that it hadn’t been him that left it there, but hoping that he would give her more. She remembered that he hadn’t spilled until Nathan arrested him later and hoped to help him avoid that. She finished getting dressed and headed back over towards the table to find a cup of black coffee in front of her this time. 

“That doesn’t sound like me,” he said amusedly. This was a game he knew how to play. 

She couldn’t help the slight chuckle, knowing that he was right about that. Even if he /was/ the type to be careless with his guns, he definitely wasn’t the type to hurt people. He couldn’t know that though so she just said, “Everybody makes mistakes.” 

“Yeah, well I didn’t make that one,” he said as he leaned back comfortably and put his feet up. “My gun was stolen.” 

“You didn’t report it?” she asked, knowing that if she had known he had, then she would have no reason to be here so she had to pretend she didn’t know. 

“Actually I did report it,” he smirked. “Nathan didn’t mention that part did he?” Duke made a guess on where she had gotten information on him from. He could tell by the look on her face that he was right. “I thought as much…so are we good?” he asked as she worked her way through her food. 

“Assuming you’re telling me the truth, yeah,” she nodded, taking a sip of her coffee. “Nathan really doesn’t like you,” she chuckled, trying to get as much information as she could on things that she wasn’t supposed to know. It would make it easier for her not to slip up. 

“Oh, let me guess what he said. He’s unreliable. Dishonest. And a general pain in the butt,” Duke mimicked Nathan. 

“Was he right?” she asked with a raised eyebrow, wanting Duke’s opinion and got a hand gesture that she took to mean somewhat. She wanted to tell him that no. Nathan wasn’t right. She had /always/ been able to rely on Duke. Dishonest, maybe. Pain in the butt was a matter of opinion. But he definitely wasn’t unreliable. She realized that she wasn’t going to get much more from Duke right now and she was finished eating, so she went to leave, remembering that she needed to call Agent Howard and then realized that she didn’t have her phone and, “Oh. Oh no. My phone…” That godawful phone that he’d gotten her was an eyesore. 

“Oh yeah. It’s toast. But I uh…I got you another one,” Duke pulled it out of his pocket. 

“A princess phone? Seriously?” she rolled her eyes. 

“I don’t think you appreciate how hard it is to find a phone in the middle of the night in this town,” he half-chided. 

“You didn’t steal it did you?” she asked curiously. She didn’t remember hearing anything about it last time between the time she had it and the time she had given it back to him, but that didn’t necessarily mean anything. 

“From a kid? What kind of monster do you take me for,” he asked mock-affronted. “Granted she was rather inebriated when I purchased it from her, but really. She shouldn’t have been drinking at her age anyway.” He didn’t mention that he had purchased it with a bottle of cheap whiskey, of course. 

Audrey let out a laugh at that as she took the phone. “I can be relatively certain that you have like, zero room to talk there.” 

“Is that so?” Duke chuckled. 

“I would be surprised if /anyone/ made it out of their teen years without indulging from time to time,” she tried to cover. 

“Including you, Agent Parker?” he asked smug and amused. 

“I’ve been known to party a bit back in my day,” she admitted, if only to break the ice between them a little more. Break through some of those carefully crafted masks. 

“Well, well. A fed sitting on my boat is rare enough, but a fed sitting here admitting to illegal activity…this might just be one for the record books,” he smirked. 

“I admitted nothing. And you can’t prove I did,” she grinned mischievously at him. 

Duke couldn’t help but laugh. “Message received,” he raised his coffee cup in acceptance of the somewhat pact between them. Not that he was going to take it for granted. It had been a long time since he’d had a run-in with the feds. They might have gotten a new playbook. He wasn’t admitting to anything, no matter how much she tried to put him at ease. 

“So you really can’t tell me anything more about Jonas Lester?” she asked. 

Duke snorted. And there it was. “Nope. Nothing. Sorry.” 

It wasn’t until she saw him shut back down that she realized that he thought she was trying to be friendly to get information to take him down for something, but she didn’t know how to fix it. She /did/ know that she wasn’t getting another word out of him on the subject though, so she just said, “Thank you. For saving my life, the clothes, breakfast, phone, all this. I do appreciate it.” She drained the last of the coffee and set the cup down before heading out, turning to look back and smiling at his somewhat bewildered expression. 

As Audrey left the boat, she called Agent Howard. “I need to meet with you,” she told him. 

“Does that mean you’ve closed the case and are ready to come back to Boston?” Howard asked confused. That wasn’t how this was supposed to work. 

“No, and I think you know that. I need to meet with you here in Haven,” she said firmly. 

“You are trying to summon /me/?” Howard asked incredulously. 

“I have a message from Charlotte. About Mara. She said it has to be in person,” Audrey pulled out the big guns. 

“I’ll be there in an hour,” Howard said startled. “You’ll be at Haven PD?” 

“Yeah. That works,” Audrey agreed. She still needed to work this case anyway. Find the evidence to convince Nathan about Marion. Granted she could do it herself, but she /needed/ him to believe. He /had/ to be able to open his mind. “Oh and I need a new phone.” 

Once she got back to the station, Nathan asked where she’d been and she countered with, “You could have told me that Duke reported his gun stolen.”

“I don’t care if he reported it. It’s his gun and he needs to explain it to me,” Nathan said coldly. 

“The guy’s not all bad. He saved my life. And then he served me breakfast.” She hoped that she would be able to get him to lighten up sooner this time. Especially about Duke. 

“I’ve known him since he was five. He’s all bad,” Nathan countered, not noticing Audrey roll her eyes at that. 

Audrey gave him a little more of the story from the morning, even trying to point out that if he was that much of a criminal, he would have been caught a long time ago if he was careless enough to just leave his own gun lying at a crime scene. She knew that Duke was very good at what he did. And at flying under the radar. While she was talking, she was pulling up the weather images she would need to start convincing him. Once this was over, she had a /lot/ of thinking and soul-searching to do, but until then she needed to keep her head in the game. She didn’t manage to get through to Nathan unfortunately, and then he showed her the scrap from Duke’s tide calendar that had been found on the body. That’s right. That was why Nathan had arrested him. As much as she might want to go with him, she had to be here when Howard got here. Plus the fact that maybe helping Duke out after Nathan arrested him would get her a modicum of trust. Not that she could blame him. She was a federal agent and he was a criminal. She wouldn’t trust her in his shoes either. 

Garland had come in and was needling her when Agent Howard came in and told him. “If you don’t mind, I need a moment with my agent.” Once he flashed his badge, Garland wandered out muttering about uppity feds. Howard closed the door and the blinds before asking, “How much do you know and how do you know Charlotte?” 

Audrey responded first by pulling the device out of her pocket and handing it to him. “There are some drives hidden in there and she said you need to get this to her right away.” 

Howard’s eyes widened as he realized what he was holding. “Things went that badly?” he asked worriedly. 

“You and the barn were destroyed when you came for me. Not my doing,” she quickly added. “But yeah. After that, things went to hell…oh. And I’m not a…what did she call it? Overlay personality anymore. Mara is gone. I’m just Audrey now…that’s not going to interfere with the barn is it? I should have asked her that.”

“It shouldn’t have any effect on the barn, no,” he shook his head. He didn’t tell her that it did affect him. That he could now take orders from her too. He didn’t plan on telling her that unless it became necessary somehow. “So you plan to come when it’s time?” 

“Yeah. I do. I’ll do what I have to if it means saving this town from the nightmare it became even before it was destroyed.” 

“Do you know what this device does? And how the barn is powered?” Howard asked curiously. 

“Yes. And I get it,” she nodded. “I know what I need to do.” She just needed to let herself love. There was nothing saying that she had to let anyone get close and then break their heart by leaving. 

“Have you told anyone else?” Howard asked seriously. 

“Not yet. There are a couple people I plan to tell at the right time, but there are things that need to happen first. Then there are a few that I might tell only if the situation warrants it,” she told him. “Charlotte told me to trust my judgement on that.”

“Yes. She clearly trusted you very much. Especially if she overwrote you as the dominant personality, so I will trust you as well. To a point. Garland Wuornos needs to know.”

“You know the chief?” she asked surprised. 

“You weren’t aware of that?” Howard asked surprised. He was sure that it would have come out at some point. If nothing else after the barn was destroyed. 

“No. In my timeline he dies a few months from now. He can’t hold himself together anymore. I’m sure you know what I mean by that.”

“Ah. Yes. I’m sorry to hear that. Does that mean you intend to prevent it?” 

“I don’t know if I can, but I’m going to try,” Audrey assured him. “If you think he needs to know, then I’ll trust your judgement too.”

“Come,” Howard said leading out of the room and to Garland’s office. “There’s been a change of plans. She knows everything,” he told Garland. 

“How? I thought it was important that she /not/ know,” Garland asked suspiciously eying them both. 

“She’s come back from the future. A future where things went very wrong,” Howard explained. 

“How far and how wrong?” Garland asked, motioning them to sit. 

That was Audrey’s question to answer. “About five years from now. When the barn came to get me, there was an incident that cause it to implode. That set off a chain reaction that caused the troubles to get /very/ out of hand and ultimately wiped out the entire town and everyone in it.” 

“How?” Garland asked. 

“There was a trouble that amplified other troubles. Then there was a trouble that caused explosions, one that generated electricity, and one that caused intense pressure. After another trouble caused everyone to have to take shelter in one building, panic set in and those four troubles combined. I was lucky enough to be away, looking for other solutions at the time, along with the only person who could send me back to prevent it.” 

“Okay. So what do you need me to do?” Garland asked, willing to do anything to prevent that, even if it meant taking orders. 

“First of all, there’s no need for the act anymore. Just offer me the job. I’ll accept, and that’ll be that.”

“Consider it done,” Garland nodded. He didn’t actually /enjoy/ manipulating people if he didn’t have to, so it was an easy request. 

“Second, after this case is over, I need you to talk to Nathan. Tell him about the troubles. About /his/ trouble.”

“He’s not ready to know. He won’t believe it,” Garland tried to tell her. 

“I know. But this case is going to make him start questioning. He won’t believe you, but it’ll put the idea in his mind and make it easier for him to see what’s right in front of him.” 

“Do you plan to tell him about the time travel thing?” Garland asked and Howard looked interested in that answer as well. 

“He’s going to be my partner. He needs to know. But not until he’s ready. Not until his mind is open enough to accept it. Which is why I need your help to /get/ him ready,” she told him. 

“If you think it’s best,” Garland sighed. 

“I do,” she nodded. “And on a more personal note, I would /suggest/ that you tell him the truth about his biological father.”

“Why?” Garland asked with narrowed eyes. 

“Because in my timeline, he found out on his own and it caused a huge mess. Not to mention, inadvertently caused /your/ death. You never told him about your trouble and you were already having trouble holding yourself together and the way he blew up at you when he found out was the last straw. And he never got over that guilt.” She had a feeling that it had contributed to his blowing up the barn. Not wanting to let another person die on him when he could have prevented it. She didn’t plan on telling either of these two that it was Nathan’s fault though. 

“I’ll think about it,” was all Garland would say to that one. “Are you planning to tell anyone else?” 

“I don’t know yet,” she partially lied. She did plan on telling Duke at some point, but hadn’t decided on anyone else. “I’ve been back for less than two hours and I only had a few minutes to think about it before I came back. Once this case is solved, I need to take some time and think things over and figure that out.”

“Fair enough,” Garland nodded. “I would appreciate knowing who all knows though.” 

“I’ll keep you in the loop,” she promised, despite having no intention of telling them about Duke. The Crocker curse made him too much of a wildcard in their minds and she didn’t want to have to deal with trying to convince them that he was different unless she had to. 

“Then you know how to solve this case? And the rest of them that will come up?” Garland asked. 

“Mostly,” she told him. “See I was inside the barn when the incident happened, and my memories got a little scrambled. I remember a lot of the big stuff, but details tend to escape me. Plus, there are things that I need to play out the way they did before to open Nathan’s mind.” When she could see his concern, she added, “I don’t plan to let anyone die or be irrevocably harmed if I can help it. But other than that, I’m not going to change much for a little while.” 

“That’s good enough then,” he agreed.

“And since my work is done here for the moment,” Howard said as he stood up and handed Audrey her new phone. “You both know how to reach me if you need me.” 

“And I need to get back to this case,” Audrey told Garland as she got up to follow him. She already knew where the case would lead her next so she didn’t need to look anything up which meant that she should have just enough time to pick up Conrad and get the false confession in time to save Duke’s ass. 

As she walked in with Conrad cuffed and saw Duke also cuffed at the table, she asked, “What’s he doing here?” She couldn’t help but smile when Duke gave her a cheery wave. “Never mind, I can guess.” Even if she hadn’t already known, she would have been able to guess that Nathan let his grudge override his sense. 

“What happened to you?” Nathan asked incredulously. 

Audrey knew she looked a mess. She had to provoke Conrad in order to get him to confess. She felt bad for arresting him, but they didn’t currently have enough on Marion to give her an evidence trail that would satisfy Nathan and he had asked for it when he confessed anyway, so she didn’t let it bother her too much. “You won’t believe me when I tell you. Just let Duke go. Conrad’s our guy.”

“Don’t think so,” Nathan crossed his arms stubbornly. 

“Did your guy confess?” Audrey asked impatiently. 

“Uh…no,” Duke chimed in raising his hands. “No he did not.” 

“Conrad?” Nathan asked skeptically. “You saying you did this?” 

“Yeah, Nathan. That’s what I’m saying,” Conrad said impatiently. 

Duke threw his hands up before saying a sincere, “Thank you, sir,” to Conrad before getting up and holding out his hands for Nathan to unlock his cuffs. “Can I go now?” 

“Sit down,” Nathan shoved him back to the chair. Duke rolled his eyes and Audrey gave him an apologetic look as Nathan grabbed the other suspect. “Conrad, come with me.” 

Audrey used the opportunity to get some goodwill from Duke. “I know you didn’t kill Lester,” she told him. 

“Well that’s fantastic. I’ll buy the first round,” Duke joked.

“But I also know that Nathan’s right. And that you saw Lester,” she said as she sat down. 

“Okay here’s the thing,” Duke said leaning towards her. “I have a rule…well…more of a guideline but...I don’t talk to cops. Even cops that I like.”

Audrey knew that she could play dirty here and that Duke would even be expecting it. And if she had to she would. She wanted to know that he could trust her anyway though. She wanted to give him a chance. “Look, Duke. I’m on your side here, okay? You saved my life, and then went above and beyond. As long as you’re not hurting anyone, I’m not looking to bust you. I just need to know what you know to help me get the one who /is/ hurting people.” She knew that was the key to him. He was a pure protector type. He’d proved it time and again. She had been quiet enough that Nathan couldn’t hear what she said before returning to a normal voice and asking, “What do these numbers mean?” 

Duke considered it for a moment. She did seem sincere. And it wasn’t like he’d done anything wrong really. At least not that would stick. Maybe giving her the benefit of the doubt wasn’t the worst thing. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t going to get something out of it himself. If for no other reason than to save face in front of Nathan. “I think an apology, from Nathan, might help me remember,” he said with a smug look at his one-time friend turned enemy. 

Audrey turned to give Nathan a look that clearly ordered him to cooperate and he ground snapped, “Fine. I apologize.” 

“Fooor…” Duke coaxed. 

“Don’t push it,” Audrey asked as much as said. 

“Look…Lester wanted me to run him up to Canada,” Duke told them. 

“Yeah?” Nathan scoffed. That didn’t surprise him in the slightest. 

“Yeah,” Duke gave him a hard look. “But smuggling escaped felons is not on my to-do list.” He wasn’t going to spell it out for them, but he could point them in the right direction. 

“Okay the two five seven eight…is that a partial phone number? Social security?” She wanted to see how far he would go. 

“Lester was looking for a boat. Maybe it’s a registration number,” Nathan suggested and Duke just shrugged theatrically, showing off the cuffs yet again as a hint. “Want to make this easy for me?” 

“No. I mean…not particularly,” Duke said matter-of-factly. 

“Fine. Harbor master’ll tell us the rest,” Nathan retorted. 

Audrey got up to grab him before he got far. “Do you mind taking care of that yourself?” He was clearly skeptical about Conrad’s story and Audrey played up being confused and looking for answers to what she personally experienced. Playing on his own need for answers for everything. It helped that she knew him well enough to do so. 

Once he finally agreed that it bore looking into, he went to leave and Duke stood up. “Excuse me? You are going to let me go first right?”

“No,” Nathan snapped. 

“Yes,” Audrey said at the same time. When Nathan looked at her incredulously, she asked, “What exactly are you planning to hold him on? Refusing to smuggle a felon out of the country?” 

“We don’t know how involved he was in finding this other boat for Lester or how,” Nathan tried to point out. 

“Then we can always pick him up again if needed. I’m sure he’s not going to bail town, are you?” she addressed the last part to Duke. 

“I have no need to,” Duke shrugged. 

“You can’t seriously trust him,” Nathan asked in disbelief. When he saw that she did he just threw up his hands. “Fine. But if this blows up in our faces, it’s on you,” he said as he stormed out. 

Audrey went over to unlock Duke’s cuffs, hoping that this wasn’t going to make things more difficult with Nathan. If nothing else, the ways she was making it easier should balance that out and they wouldn’t be in any worse situation than the last time around. “I’m sticking my neck out for you, Duke,” she still had to tell him. 

“Look, I didn’t do anything but give the guy some info. There’s no law against that,” Duke protested, rubbing his now free wrists. 

“That depends on what info you gave him and how closely related that is to his death,” she pointed out. “It could make you an accessory. Fair warning. That said, you gave us what we needed to know to follow the trail and I’m not asking any more questions than that.” She already knew how it happened and that Duke wasn’t exactly an accessory, but hopefully her stated stance would give her a little more leeway with him in the future. Force could /work/ with him, but it wasn’t the best way and this time around she knew that. 

Duke blinked at her in confusion. She just admitted that she thought he could be guilty but was letting him go anyway and refusing to ask questions. Was she really that grateful that he saved her life? “I really didn’t have anything to do with his death. Accessory or otherwise,” he told her sincerely. 

“I believe you,” she told him, realizing that her hopes had been founded. “Oh and here you go,” she handed him the princess phone back. “I got a replacement so you can go ahead and play hero and get any reward money for ‘finding’ it,” she laughed, remembering when he’d told her about salvaging her car, selling it, and still keeping the reward money so it seemed like something that he would do. 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said with a smirk as he took it and put it in his pocket. “Catch you later, Agent Parker,” he said with a wink as he walked out and Audrey got back to work on the case. 

She knew that she would need a trail of evidence to convince Nathan of anything so she got started trying to find it and was soon interrupted by Vince and Dave showing her the Colorado Kid picture. She winced at the memory of how much that had driven her crazy last time around, but played it up. At least until or unless she decided to bring them in on the secret and like she remembered doing last time, let them help her find what she was looking for and it was just in time as Nathan called her with the last pieces of the puzzle. 

Once they had Marion handled and set up with Conrad, and Nathan questioning everything, she went back to the bed and breakfast and let herself finally think about all the crap she’d learned today and everything she had to do. The first thing on her mind, now that she had time to think about it was the fact that Duke was her soulmate. And the fact that she hadn’t been as surprised as she would have expected to be. She couldn’t deny that she loved Duke. There had always been something about him that drew her in like a moth to flame and now she knew why. She had resisted that feeling for so long last time because of his criminal activities. That and the fact that she couldn’t figure him out. She’d gotten over that about the time he helped throw her that birthday party, but hadn’t gotten up the nerve to do anything about it until the trip to Colorado and then he shut her out and started pushing her towards Nathan so she did her best to get over him and move on. 

She and Nathan had been happy together, sure. But it had never felt truly right. Now that she was letting herself consider it again, and willing to admit it to herself, the only thing that had ever really felt right…perfect, even…was Colorado. For the first minute anyway. Until Duke pulled away. For that one brief moment, everything had slotted into place. She had /known/ that she’d found her place. And then it all went away in the aftermath and the doubts set in and just kept growing. Knowing now that he was her soulmate…that changed things. That meant that whatever connection they had, he felt too. She wondered if he’d pulled away because it had scared him. Or maybe it had to do with Nathan. Or maybe because she was a cop. She didn’t know, but whatever it was didn’t matter anymore. They were real. And just like that her decision was made. 

She still loved Nathan, and probably always would, but not like the way she loved Duke. That didn’t mean that she was just going to jump in. Even if he would, which was unlikely. She remembered it took him a while to get over her being a cop enough to ask her out. Hopefully that would go a little quicker now that she was working with him instead of strong-arming him. She decided that when he did, when he was past it enough to take that step, she would tell him everything. Maybe not the soulmate part. That would take a little more thought. But the troubles, her past lives, the future, and most importantly, her fate. She didn’t know if he would think it would be worth it to have the little time they could or if he would rather avoid the pain, but she would give him that choice. He deserved that much at least. And she would respect his choice, whatever it was. 

That would mean that she would need to keep an emotional distance from Nathan. That would probably be a good idea even if she hadn’t chosen Duke though. He’d already proven that he couldn’t handle letting her go and she couldn’t risk him losing it again and doing something stupid. She would hope that knowing what it would cause would stop him, but she couldn’t be positive. Having advanced warning might also help, but again…there was no way to be sure. He hadn’t respected her decision then and if she let him get too close, he might not now either.


	3. Chapter 3

By the next morning, Audrey had a decent idea how she wanted to handle things and who she wanted to tell and when. Including the fact that there was no reason not to tell Vince and Dave. It would be best for them to know at some point anyway, and there was no reason not to make it now. Dave would need to know that she was going by her own choice and that there wasn’t another way so he wouldn’t try to convince her to find one again. Vince would need to know to keep the guard off her back and keep them assured that she would be leaving and taking the troubles with her so they could avoid the shows of force. 

She couldn’t remember how much time she had before the next trouble came up, nor could she remember off the top of her head what it was. Hopefully, she would remember once it got started and she had something to go on. Instead, she took the day to tour the town and bask in the fact that it was alive and in one piece again. Seeing all the people she lost back alive. She may not be able to show her reactions. At least, not yet, but that didn’t mean that she couldn’t feel them. Her first stop was the Herald where she gave Vince and Dave the basic story of the future and told her that she knew everything and what she had to do and would be going in the barn when it was time. She also took the opportunity to hug them both, now that they could know how glad she was that they were alive again. 

Once they had the story and asked all their questions, she turned to Vince and said, “And I know about Duke’s family curse. You need to know that he isn’t like the other Crockers. He can and will control it and only ever use it in the direst of emergencies. He won’t let the rev or any of those creeps use him. You /will/ keep the guard off his back.” 

“If I have your assurances that we will be safe, I will make sure that he is as well until or unless he actually becomes a threat,” Vince promised. He had always had a feeling that Duke would be different but having a little more reassurance of that fact definitely helped. 

Audrey ended up spending most of the day at the Herald before making excuses to leave and wandering the rest of town. It wasn’t until the next morning that she heard the talk about the giant ball in the Rust Bucket and made her way over there to meet Nathan and help. Unfortunately, she still couldn’t remember what was going on. It wasn’t until she saw the butterfly that she remembered with a muttered, “Oh, crap.” She grabbed her phone and called Nathan for help. She was quick enough to actually get the words out this time at least and she wasn’t quite as close to suffocation by the time he cut her out of the stupid cocoon. She continued along like normal, and had briefly considered not saving the rev from the car, but her conscience won out in the end. Since she knew who and where to find the evidence, in the kid’s room, they were able to wrap it up quicker and save at least some of the trouble that it caused. The rev still kicked the kid out and Hannah still went with him though. 

Her transfer had just gone through and she went to find Nathan and let him know. She found him sitting on a bench looking out over the water. Once she told him he just said, “Good.”

“Why do you say that?” she asked curiously, trying to figure out if the chief had told him anything yet. 

“February nineteen eighty three. I was seven. I went sledding on that hill right over there,” he pointed to the other side of the inlet. I crashed into a tree, but I felt…fine, so I ran back up the hill, ready to go again and Lisa Botky took one look at me and threw up. I had blood all over my coat and a bone sticking out of my arm and I never felt a thing. Wasn’t the only thing that happened that year. Don’t remember a lot of it. Just…people whispering. Kids pulled out of school.”

“The troubles,” she said looking for an agreement from him.

Nathan nodded. “A couple years later, I got better and stopped hearing about them.”

“And you’re afraid they’re coming back?” She had to know that he believed. Really believed. 

“No. They are back,” he said seriously. “I’m afraid they won’t go away this time.” 

“They will,” she promised. He wasn’t ready for the whole story yet, but she could tell him some of it. 

“How can you be sure?” Nathan asked skeptically. 

“Because I /know/. I can tell you why they keep coming back and why they keep disappearing…if you want to know,” she offered. 

“Of course, I want to know,” he said as if it should be obvious. Anything that could give him some answers. And some piece of mind. 

“It’s me,” she told him. She had no intention of telling him that she created the troubles in the first place of course. Especially since that part of her was gone for good. She needed to give him that piece of mind though. And get him used to the fact that she wouldn’t be staying. “It’s hard to explain, really, but basically there’s this thing…I call it the barn…it’s able to keep the troubles away, but it needs a person, me, to act as something like a battery. But I can’t last forever. That’s why the troubles always start to come back in a trickle as it loses power and then I’m expelled to come back into this world and recharge.”

“Recharge on what?” Nathan asked confused. 

“It sounds cliché, but…love. Helping people, making friends, finding home. It…soothes my soul, I guess you could say, and gives me the strength to go back in and do it all over again. When I’m out, I come here, to help with the troubles. Every time I come out of the barn in a new cycle, I’m a different person. Different memories, different personalities. I don’t remember anything about my past lives or who I was before.”

“So basically, every time you go into this barn, you die. You have to walk away from the home and friends that you’ve found. All the people you’ve helped and cared for, and then just, what…be erased? How is that even fair?” Nathan asked incredulously. He wasn’t sure he believed this story yet, but it really was too crazy not to be true and he would at least get as much info as he could before he dismissed it. He’d had his entire world turned upside down so much the last few days that he wasn’t ready to dismiss anything without consideration right now. “And how do you even know all this if you don’t remember anything from before?” 

“I still don’t remember anything about my past lives and I’m not supposed to know the rest. Because it makes it harder to find that home and settle in so that I can recharge when I know that it’s going to end soon. But this time is different. I can’t really tell you how or why yet. But no, it’s not really fair, but everything has a price. I volunteered to do this. To help all of the people that are hurt by the troubles. I re-volunteer every time. The barn can’t force me to go. I have to /choose/ to go of my own free will. As the person I am at that time.” 

“And you’ve already chosen?” Nathan asked. “When will it happen?” 

“December tenth of next year. I need about a year and a half to recharge. And then I disappear and the troubles go with me. So you don’t have to be afraid that they won’t. I know what I need to do, and I could never let so many suffer and die.” 

“But you said that knowing all this makes it harder for you to ‘recharge’. How do you know it won’t affect things?” 

“I can’t really explain right now, but I promise you, it won’t.” 

“You can’t explain right now but you’ll be able to later?” Nathan asked. 

“Maybe. Probably,” she told him. She needed to see how he settled with this before she threw the rest of the crapload at him. 

“Who else knows all this?” Nathan asked. 

“Your dad knows some of it. Maybe most of it, I’m not sure. He knew me last time around when I was Lucy,” Audrey told him. She knew that he would be confirming her story. “Vince and Dave know a lot of it too. They knew me as both Lucy and Sarah before that.” 

“I thought you said you couldn’t remember your past lives?” Nathan narrowed his eyes at her suspiciously. 

“I can’t,” she shrugged. “That’s why those are the only two I know anything about at all and even then I don’t know much. Oh and that my name was Veronica in nineteen oh one, but I know even less about that life than the others. That I only know from a blurb I found in the newspaper. The last two have been relatively easy to learn about since there are still people alive that knew me then.” 

“I guess that makes sense,” he decided. “So basically you’re here to help with the troubles for the next year and a half and then you’re leaving.” 

“Yeah. And I’ll be back with new memories and a new identity twenty seven years later. If you’re still here then, you can’t tell me about my past. I have to be ready to learn it which means I have to find it myself. Once I have you can confirm what I already know though, of course,” she told him. 

“I’ll try to remember that,” Nathan nodded. And he would also try not to get too attached to her. 

“Good. I guess I’ll see you at work tomorrow then,” she told him as she got up to leave, letting him be alone with his thoughts. She would let the chief know in the morning how much Nathan knew and not to let on about the time travel yet. 

It was a couple days later when they got a call about a disturbance at the Freddy and she spent the entire drive thinking over the case and trying to figure out the best way to handle it before she decided it would be best to let it run it’s course. No one had died, and Dr. Lucassi needed to be able to rule everything else out and see it in action before he would be willing to let the patients leave on the boat. She had a brief stab of guilt over letting Nathan go after Duke, but she remembered how that incident was a turning point in their relationship. The fact that Duke hadn’t fought back because he could tell that Nathan wasn’t himself was Nathan’s first clue that he might be wrong about his old friend and apparently they’d talked a little bit out while Duke had him locked down. It wasn’t like either of them had been hurt too badly after all. This was also when Duke learned about the troubles being back which was important, so yeah. She would have to let it all play out like before. 

This time she didn’t need to have Laverne track Nathan’s car. She already knew where he was and followed after him. Once she got him tased she had to force her eyes away from Duke for a few minutes to check on him and get herself under control before she could look back up. She’d forgotten that he’d been sweaty and shirtless and she couldn’t let him see how much she enjoyed that. “Sorry I had to do that Nathan,” she said with a wince. “Are you okay?” she asked them both. 

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Duke panted, still trying to catch his breath after being almost choked to death. 

“Nathan?” she asked when he didn’t reply. 

“Nothing. Felt nothing,” he muttered as he tried to get up before collapsing again. 

“What’s going on?” Duke asked, having put some distance between himself and Nathan. 

“I need you to keep him here,” Audrey said as she got up and turned around, composed enough now to hide her feelings. 

“No,” Duke said simply, turning to walk away. He did /not/ want to get involved in this. Things were rough enough between him and Nathan without having to deal with him like this. 

“He’s sick, Duke,” Audrey tried to explain as she rushed after him. 

Duke turned and looked seriously at her, “I knew that.” That much was obvious from the second he saw him. 

“This is different alright? Something…something just happened to him.” 

Duke looked between her and Nathan nervously as he asked, “Is he contagious?...I’m just asking,” he held up his hands in surrender. It was a perfectly reasonable question under the circumstances. 

“No, he’s not,” she told him. “But I know someone who is and if I don’t get to him soon, he’s going to make more like him.” 

“Aww man,” Duke knew that he was going to be stuck babysitting insane Nathan. 

“I gotta go,” Audrey said as she turned to leave. When he opened his mouth to argue, she stopped and looked earnestly at him. “This is the part where you come through for me right?” She didn’t want to remind him of how she stuck her neck out if she didn’t have to and she could see in the defeated slump of his shoulders that she’d won. “Thank you.” 

Audrey was with Dr. Lucassi, ‘learning’ that it was Ray causing it instead of Lily and they were trying to track down the boat. She remembered that it was in dry dock, but not where. Besides, she needed Duke to come along and help anyway, and just in time she got his call. “Yeah, uh…sleeping beauty just woke up and I’m all done playing prince charming.” 

“I’m on my way,” she promised, not at all surprised to get there and find Duke had made coffee for Nathan. He really was a good guy, no matter how hard he tried to hide it. 

“I caught it didn’t I?” Nathan asked resignedly. 

“How are you feeling?” she asked. 

“I’m not sure which is worse. Going crazy or being sane afterwards,” Nathan sighed. 

“What do you remember?” Audrey asked. 

“The Shiny Scupper. That’s it,” he lied. He wasn’t even sure /why/ he lied beyond the fact that he didn’t want to remember. He didn’t want to think about what he’d done and he definitely didn’t want to face the niggling doubts that he now had about his opinion of Duke. Duke hadn’t fought back when he was being attacked. Just kept trying to calm him down. The bone-deep hurt he’d seen when he was accusing him of using people and the way he’d snapped when he’d been accused of using Audrey were the biggest clue. Sure, he could be ‘playing the victim’ but that had never been Duke’s style. If anything, he was the opposite. Either way, admitting that he remembered would mean being asked to analyze all that. 

Audrey and Nathan talked out the theories and he agreed that Ray was the likely cause. As they were headed off Duke’s boat, Audrey said, loudly enough for him to hear. “I guess we have to find the Caprice.”

“I know where the boat is,” Duke said smugly, as Audrey was waiting for. 

“Great. Where?” she asked. 

“I’ll take you to her,” Duke offered. 

“No. Just tell us,” Nathan interrupted before Audrey could give in. 

“Oh. Okay, forget it,” he started to walk off. 

“If you know and you don’t tell us, we can arrest you,” Nathan pointed out. 

Duke turned around, irritation shining in his face. “No. You can’t. And frankly I’m getting a little sick of the threat. Considering that a police officer just attacked me…” 

“Mr. Crocker,” Nathan said formally. “I encourage you to file a complaint and press charges.” He needed Duke to prove that he was right about him from the start. To keep him from overthinking everything. 

Duke scrutinized him for a moment trying to figure out what game he was playing before he just shook his head. “Not my style Nathan.” 

“Why do you want to come?” Audrey asked, putting a stop to the dick measuring contest and hoping to get something that would cause a little less friction with Nathan over the fact that he was definitely coming. 

“Because I’m a good citizen,” he quipped. At her expectant look, he gave her the real answer. “And I want to know what the hell is going on around here.” 

Duke wasn’t happy to keep being left by the car, but Audrey couldn’t risk him ending up catching this thing too. She couldn’t handle both of them going crazy at once which meant that she could only take one. And she knew that a sane Duke wouldn’t hurt Nathan, but she couldn’t say what Nathan would do to Duke in ‘self-defense’. Not to mention that Nathan was her partner. She didn’t have any excuse to leave him behind. Duke was always handy to have around though. He pulled some strings that she didn’t want to know about to get the boat put into the water in the middle of the night and by the time the sun was coming up, they were pulling out to sea. 

“You’re not gonna tell anyone right?” Duke asked conversationally as he strolled up to Audrey who seemed lost in thought looking over the water. When she just looked at him confused he clarified, “About me being a good citizen.”

“Oh. No. No, you’re secret’s safe with me,” she smiled. Not like the whole world didn’t figure it out eventually anyway. No, she planned to tell Nathan what Duke was like in the future once she got around to telling him that part, but that didn’t really count. “Thanks for helping.” 

“Oh, I’m gonna send you and Nathan a bill,” he joked. “I charge double for night work.” When she laughed he couldn’t ignore that feeling in his gut that had been bugging him since they met. “I’m glad I could help,” he couldn’t help but say as they lapsed into a comfortable silence before he got up the nerve to ask what he’d really come over here to ask in the first place. “The troubles are back aren’t they?” 

“Yeah, I think so,” Audrey admitted, marveling at the difference between Duke and Nathan. Nathan had to have it shoved in his face before he would believe it, but Duke just saw a few little things and put the pieces together in the correct way. 

As she walked off, Duke looked out over the water. This thing with Audrey…it was like nothing that he’d ever felt before but similar enough that he had some idea what it was. He just didn’t want to believe it. There was no way he was falling for a damn cop. That was the stupidest idea in a long line of stupid ideas. But he felt powerless to stop it. That didn’t mean that he had to give in though which was the main reason he’d made a date…well, a business date…but still. Of course, she had to show up and ruin that too. 

A couple days later, Saturday morning, she went by to talk to Duke. She was going to use the excuse of looking into Lucy, but she really just wanted to see him. She had forgotten that she’d done that last time too until she saw the woman waiting for him and she tried to stamp down the stab of jealousy. Still, just leaving without even a token attempt would look stupid, so she tried only to be shut down in a familiar way. “You know, I would love to help, but I think I made it pretty clear, I don’t talk to cops. Not even cops I like, which…technically you would be the only one, so congratulations, but nonetheless I still don’t do it.” 

“That was almost a compliment,” she joked. “Heavy on the almost.” She had caught the cut of his eyes during that conversation and noticed the woman listening without looking like she was and realized how she could have missed that last time. And she called herself a detective. Clearly there was something shady going on and she didn’t want to know. 

“I’ll be more careful next time. I do have plans,” he gestured towards the woman waiting for him. 

“Wait. Can you just wait?” she asked, more to keep up appearances for him than anything. The last thing she wanted was to get him in trouble so seeming pushy and giving him a chance to blow her off more clearly would only be a good thing. 

Audrey raised an eyebrow when he turned around and told her something in Russian and he barely resisted the urge to roll his eyes. “Relax. She’s an esthetician not an arms dealer,” he told her. 

“I could make you talk to me, you know,” she said amusedly. 

“You could,” he told her. “Or you could just make things a whole lot easier on yourself and just wait until I’m in a more cooperative mood.” 

Once again she noticed something that she’d missed last time with the glint of mischief in his eyes at that statement and she just returned it as she said. “Fine. Later,” and stole one of his grapes before walking away. It wasn’t until she heard him call after her to check out the farmer’s market that she remembered what was coming next and she groaned. 

As Audrey turned over this one in her head, she considered telling Nathan about the time travel, but he hadn’t brought anything regarding that up to her again since so clearly he was still processing. She knew that if she pushed to hard too fast with Nathan he would shut down. Not to mention, telling him about the time travel before he knew about his biological father would be a nightmare because she couldn’t /not/ tell him if she was telling him the story and he deserved to hear it from the chief if at all possible, so that wasn’t the best idea. How often could she use the ‘I can’t tell you how I know’ excuse before he got fed up with it though? 

She tried to remember if anyone had died on this one and as far as she could remember, not until the end. So she had to stop it before then definitely. A lot of people ended up with food poisoning though and she didn’t think she could live with herself if she didn’t at least try to prevent that. Once she got Nathan down to the farmer’s market and convinced him that there was a trouble happening, they started working on a list of vendors. She couldn’t just come out and say that it was the Second Chance Bistro and she only remembered the name because of Duke’s story about the second-chancers. Still, she would ping it the second it came up and save them a lot of useless running around. 

Once they got there, Audrey was trying to figure out how to get Bill alone to talk about this when Duke came in with his mystery box and she was once again kicking herself for being so blind last time. How could anyone call this man selfish? She knew that he wouldn’t try to rip off his friends which meant that whatever was in that box was worth at least five hundred dollars and he just gave it away for free the second Meg mentioned that they were tight on money. She waited until after he left to get Bill alone to try and talk to him. It took her pissing him off and then having to show him what happened to convince him, and he felt sick. She tried to talk him through controlling it and then left, patting herself on the back for a job well done. 

She and Nathan went to the grand opening together…as friends of course…just like they had last time. Audrey wanted to support the McShaws after everything they’d been through and Nathan just got dragged along. Just because she wasn’t going to let him get /too/ close didn’t mean they couldn’t be friends. She was determined to have that much at least. They were still waiting for the first course when Duke plopped down at their table and it didn’t take her long to figure out that he’d been flirting with her and trying to fish for whether or not she and Nathan were on a date. Yet another thing she’d missed last time. Once he made his point clear, he headed into the kitchen area to talk to Jeff and Bill and to her they looked like they were celebrating before Jeff came out and announced the first course. 

Audrey wasn’t paying much attention to the food at first as she watched Duke and Bill talking and then Bill was heading for John Roberts and there was something nagging at her consciousness that she couldn’t place. Not until she saw Bill getting pissed and she cursed. “Nathan stop eating,” she hissed. She’d forgotten that Jeff was going to sell Bill out to John. She immediately looked for Jeff, finding him not eating and breathed a sigh of relief. At least he wasn’t going to die and everyone else just got food poisoning. She stood up to yell for everyone to stop eating but by then there were already screams ringing out. 

When she got the call the next morning to meet Nathan at the docks, she had a sinking feeling. But Jeff hadn’t eaten anything last night. She was sure of it. Sure enough, Jeff had died and she could tell by the look on Duke’s face that he was barely holding it together. Audrey knew that she was missing something and was trying to wrack her mind for what could have happened. Nathan insisted on talking to Duke, which she got, but she did threaten him to be nice on the way in, and thankfully he listened. Not that it kept him from leaning against the wall with his arms crossed stiffly as Duke poured himself drink after drink as he told them about Jeff and the second chancers and Audrey caught the last comment Duke made about hearing the noise and thinking he tripped and knew that he was blaming himself. 

Audrey had a feeling that she could remember what happened and who was responsible if she just sat down with it for a few minutes and she would. But first, she was worried about Duke. He hadn’t looked so good when he walked out. She let Nathan go talk to John Roberts alone and she went to find Duke. When she saw him sitting morosely on the edge of the dock hugging his knees to his chest, she felt a stab of sympathy. She slowly walked over and sat down. 

“You know, Geoff hated the water. He did. He got sick every time we took him out. In fact, I think he cooked fish as a revenge on the ocean. And then he died in it,” Duke said hauntedly. “It's a shame. Any other circumstance, I would have appreciated the irony.” He leaned his head back on the post and closed his eyes against the wash of emotion. “It's one hell of a grand opening, huh?”

“They'll never forget it, that's for sure,” Audrey wasn’t sure what else to say to that. 

Duke wanted to change the subject. /Needed/ to change the subject. At least for a few minutes. He recentered himself and told her, “By the way, you looked nice in that dress last night.”

“Nice,” she huffed. She’d never known that word as an actual compliment. 

“I meant nice,” Duke said sincerely meeting her eyes. 

“Thank you,” she all but whispered giving him a slight smile. 

“It's just nice to see another side of Officer-Agent Parker,” he joked. 

Audrey couldn’t help but laugh. “I am pretty sure you saw every single side of me the day we met when you fished me out of the water.”

Duke sighed sadly. “It's a shame you're a cop.”

“And why is that?” she asked amusedly despite knowing the answer. 

“I don't usually socialize with cops,” he said as though it should be obvious. 

“Did it ever occur to you that that might be their choice?” she partially teased. Mostly she just wanted him to realize that he /could/ socialize with her. That she wanted to. 

“No,” he said thoughtfully. 

As much as Audrey appreciated the conversation, she knew that she needed to get back to work now that he was a little steadier. “Hey, I know it's not gonna fix anything, but I'm gonna figure out what happened to your friend,” she promised, hating herself for letting it happen in the first place. 

“I know you will...Officer-Agent Parker,” he said with a slightly playful lilt despite his sadness. 

She was bowled over by the pure faith in her that she could see in his eyes and wondered if the same thing was there last time or if that had changed. She took the chance to reach out and squeeze his hand. “And you know it’s not your fault, right? You couldn’t have known.” 

Duke closed his eyes and squeezed her hand back but didn’t say anything. There was nothing he /could/ say. He couldn’t agree with her, but there was no point in disagreeing. 

Audrey smiled sadly as she got up, giving his hand one more squeeze before walking away. She just hoped that he wouldn’t hate her when he learned whose fault it really was. She got in her car and drove away, wracking her brain to remember what the hell happened. Had she really been so focused on the trouble last time that the rest just slipped through her mind? Or was this another of those things that got all muddled in the aftermath of the barn? She hated this. She’d never really noticed all the gaps before because she still had the gist of everything. And she remembered the most important things. Emotions were much clearer than the rest. 

As she thought over it she realized that the memories closer to the barn were a lot clearer so maybe it had started at the beginning and was working it’s way forward when she made it out? It was just so frustrating. Once things happened again it was like her memory was refreshed and it was clear as day, both times, but until then it was like a very persistent case of de ja vu. Even that conversation with Duke. She was remembering having it even as it was happening. Before, she had remembered the gist of it, but not the words. She was just pulling in at the station when it dawned on her and she immediately called the ME who confirmed that it was anaphylactic shock and she burst in on Nathan’s interview. “I know what happened.”

They got the sous chef taken away in cuffs and processed in just enough time for Audrey to make the wake for Jeff. She wanted to be there for Duke, and she was even a little early. When Bill asked her if she thought that getting rid of the restaurant might solve his trouble, she remembered the last time around, glad that she at least got the memory of the old conversation /before/ the conversation happened, and she also remembered that it /had/ helped his trouble. That he hadn’t had any problems at all after he all but gave Duke the restaurant, so she agreed that it would probably help. Last time she hadn’t known what he was going to do, but this time she did.


	4. Chapter 4

Audrey didn’t see Duke much for the next week as he was getting ready for his grand reopening of the newly renamed Grey Gull. It was the afternoon before when she got a call to the docks for a case and as soon as Vince and Dave mentioned that he’d aged since they found him, she sucked in a sharp breath. She remembered this case. Not the details unfortunately, but she remembered the babies that killed the fathers. She remembered that Duke almost died. She remembered that the woman prowled the Grey Gull looking for men. She just couldn’t remember when or who. Not until Beaty walked up with the baby and then it came to her. She waited until Nathan was holding the baby before she pulled Beaty to the side. “I know your troubled,” she said gently. 

“No, I…I’m not. I don’t know…” Beaty stammered nervously, glancing around. 

“Hey, it’s okay. I know it’s not your fault,” Audrey assured her. “But this is going to keep happening unless we can find a way to stop it.”

“I…I don’t know how. I…I’m sorry,” Beaty blinked the tears from her eyes. 

“Hey. It’s okay. Why don’t you start by telling me what happened?” she coaxed. 

“I’m not sure really. I woke up on Saturday morning pregnant. I didn’t remember anything about the night before, and then on Sunday…the baby was born. That’s it. That’s all I know.” 

“Okay, which means Helena comes out on Friday nights,” Audrey realized. 

Beaty sucked in a sharp breath. “How do you know that name?” she asked fearfully. 

“It’s a long and complicated story. But what you need to know is that every time she comes out and sleeps with someone, that person dies. That’s how the babies are born so fast. Because they suck the life out of their fathers,” Audrey explained. 

“Oh god,” Beaty gasped covering her mouth. “I didn’t know. I swear.” 

“I know. It’s fine. Why don’t we take you down to the station and lock you up for tonight. You won’t be charged with anything. It’s just for protection, okay?” she suggested. 

“Yeah. Okay. I don’t want to hurt anyone,” she quickly agreed. 

“Do you have anyone to keep the baby for tonight?” Audrey asked and got a nod. “Okay, great. Why don’t you call and make arrangements and then we can go straight there okay?” 

“Parker?” Nathan asked as he came up, still holding the baby. “What’s going on?” 

She gave him a quick update on the trouble and what they were going to do and he looked suspiciously at her, but she couldn’t budge on this one. This was people’s lives. Jeff dying was a mistake and it was tearing her apart badly enough. She couldn’t intentionally let this go on and they were running out of time. Nathan went along with her, but she could tell that she was going to be in for an interrogation soon enough. 

Once they got Beaty locked down, they still had to ID the dead guy. Audrey remembered asking around at the Grey Gull, so she went to do just that, but Nathan decided to start canvasing elsewhere. They didn’t have the software to de-age the picture so she would just have to tell people that he might have been younger. She was mostly just there for the conversation that she remembered most of and had every intention of playing it as close to what she could remember as possible. She flashed the picture around for a while with no luck before she stood up on a chair and yelled out that anyone who could tell her anything would drink free before she heard, “For a month,” come from beside her and turned to see Duke who took the picture from her hand and started passing it around before he reached up for her hand to help her off the chair. “So…what are you drinking?” 

“I’m not drinking actually,” she told him. Not that she was opposed to starting. 

“Audrey,” he said seriously. “It’s my grand reopening party. Have a drink,” he said amusedly. 

“Okay, maybe just one,” she grabbed one off the tray as it came by. 

“It is Friday night,” Duke pointed out to her. 

“Yeah. It is. And this is really good by the way,” she said as she sipped the drink. “But I really need to canvas the crowd.” She remembered saying so she did. 

“Would you relax if I told you that nobody here knows your dead guy?” Duke asked wearily. 

“How do you know that?” she asked. 

“People like to talk, I like to listen,” he shrugged. When she seemed ready to continue arguing he said slowly and clearly. “Officer Parker. You. Need. To. Clock. Out. Now.” 

“Okay well coming from a man who’s never really worked a day in his life, that doesn’t mean that much,” she teased. 

“Oh, now that’s not how friends talk to each other,” Duke replied, nerves and amusement battling for purchase. “And I feel like…at this point…we’re…we’re friends,” he managed to say, testing the waters. See her reaction before bringing up any more. He felt better when she nodded in agreement, so he added. “And as your friend, I worry about you. All you do is work. And it would be sad if you realize one day that you forgot to live your life.”

“Yeah, well if I keep eating this unhealthy, I’m not going to have a life to forget about,” she chuckled as she ate the olive. 

“You quit working…for one night…and I will cook you a healthy delicious dinner,” Duke coaxed, trying to get across by his tone that it could be casual or not. That would be up to her. 

“That’s so sweet…”

“Next Friday night. Right here,” he said confidently. Her lack of revulsion or immediate dismissal giving him more courage. 

“You? Plan something in advance? I bet that’s not gonna happen,” she joked. 

“I bet you you cancel before I do,” Duke smirked. 

“Not a chance,” she grinned. Now that they got this trouble worked out, there wasn’t a force in hell that would make her miss it. 

He grinned, emboldened by her response, but had to keep teasing. “I can hear the call now. Oh, sorry Duke, I can’t make it…the future of mankind depends on me.” He disappeared into the crowd as he was talking, not wanting to mess up a good thing since he actually got the yes and the smile on her face just made him feel even better. Dating a cop was just playing with fire, but right now he didn’t really care if he got burned. 

Audrey stuck around for a little while longer before heading back to the bed and breakfast, trying to think of anything coming up that could derail her planned date and couldn’t think of anything. She wondered if actually making the date this time might change things. Then it dawned on her that maybe that was the problem between them last time around. She’d already hurt him once and he was afraid to risk his heart again. She’d always felt bad about not making the date, but now she felt even worse. 

The next week seemed to crawl by, but finally Friday rolled around. As soon as Audrey got Beaty settled in for the night, she left early and went to get ready for her date. She knew Duke and knew that he wasn’t really the dressing up type, so she went more casual too, but still nice. She got there a few minutes early and found Duke out on the patio that was closed off for the night from the public and he turned away from the grill with a grin as she came up. “Well it looks like neither of us win the bet.” 

“Winning isn’t everything,” she grinned as he held out a hand to her and she took it. 

“On the menu this evening is a grilled tiger shrimp marinated in coconut. Just came in this morning,” he said as he pulled out her chair for her. 

“Sounds perfect. Did you know shrimp was my favorite?” she asked suspiciously. 

“I might have done a little scouting ahead,” he admitted with a smirk. 

“That was very sweet of you.”

“Hey, if I’m only gonna get one shot at this, gotta make it count,” he chuckled. 

“What makes you think you only get one shot?” she asked amusedly. 

“Is that an offer, officer Parker?” he said with a waggle of his eyebrows. 

“Maybe,” she drawled. 

“And what do I need to do to turn that maybe into a yes?” he asked jokingly despite the fact that he actually wanted an answer. 

“There are some things you need to know before we get too involved,” she took a turn for the serious. 

“Oookay,” Duke felt a sudden well of nervousness. “That’s never a good sign.” He set the plates on the table. “Might as well eat while you’re crushing my heart,” he laughed tightly. 

“I hope that’s not what I’m doing,” Audrey said softly, not knowing if she intended for him to hear it or not. 

“Then what are you doing?” 

“I can’t be here for long,” she told him sadly. “December tenth next year, I’ll be gone. For good.” 

“I’m getting the idea that this isn’t a normal moving away kind of thing?” Duke said leadingly. 

“No,” she shook her head with a sigh. “It’s the troubles. I’m linked to them. See, every twenty seven years, I have to come back here to recharge before I can take them away again which involves me leaving. When I come back the next time, I’m a completely different person with no memories of this life.” 

“If this is your way of saying you don’t want to do this…” 

“No, Duke,” she reached across the table and took his hand. “I do. Very much. But I don’t want to hurt you when I leave either, so…whatever we have is up to you. You want to walk away and save yourself the trouble, I completely understand.” 

“I just…I need to understand this first. I mean, how do you know? Can’t someone else do it? Why does it have to be you?” 

“I know because I’m from the future,” she told him, getting a snort of disbelief. “I know it sounds crazy, but when I’m from, I didn’t get to go away. There were people who didn’t want me to go and one of them broke the barn that takes me and the troubles away. Because of it, all the troubles spiraled out of control and the whole town was wiped out. I /have/ to go. I’m the only one that can do it.”

“Why?” Duke asked again. 

“Because…my original self, who is now dead by the way, was the one who created the troubles in the first place. They’re tied to me. This cycle…coming here, finding a home, friends, love, and then sacrificing it all…it’s my penance.”

“So…you know me in this future then?” he asked skeptically. 

“Yeah. I do.”

“Prove it.” 

She took a minute to think of something that he knew that no one else did. She knew a lot that he didn’t know himself but that wouldn’t help her any. “You have a necklace with the initials LR engraved on it for Lucy Ripley. She gave it to you back in eighty-three and told you that you’d find someone to give it to. You gave it to me on my birthday a few months from now.” Then she thought of something else. “Or…I know…you know I’ve never been in the stateroom in your boat yet, but I can tell you that there is a secret escape hatch in the second bookshelf from the kitchen. The latch is behind the top shelf which comes off.” 

“Okay. I believe you,” Duke stopped her before she started spilling any more of his secrets. “So this future…were we together there?” He wondered if that was why she agreed to this date so easily. 

“No,” she sighed sadly. “It was…complicated.” 

“Complicated how?” he asked. 

“We wanted to be together. At least I did and I’m pretty sure you did too, but everything got all messed up. Starting with tonight when a trouble was killing people and I had to stand you up.”

“I would have understood that,” Duke said confused. 

“Yeah. I know,” she said regretfully. “Except that I forgot to call and tell you I couldn’t make it.”

“Forgot to call or /couldn’t/ call?” 

“Forgot,” she admitted. “We stayed friends though. Best friends even. But there was definitely more there. There were a few more false starts that got derailed for one reason or another and then came the date I was supposed to leave. When the barn was killed, I was trapped inside for over six months. By the time I got back, everything was going haywire and you were pushing me away and then…”

“Did I die?” he asked when she cut herself off. 

“No. Worse.”

“What’s worse?” Duke asked. 

“It doesn’t matter. It’s not going to happen this time,” she said firmly.

“Audrey…”

“I don’t even want to think about it, much less talk about it,” she almost begged him to drop it. 

“Okay,” he sighed. “So…how long have you been back here?” 

“Since the time we met. I came back as I was walking out onto the deck of the boat,” she told him. 

“So what you’re saying is that you…care about me, but…if I go through with this, then I have to be prepared to lose you in less than a year and a half and there’s nothing I can do about it,” Duke summed up. Since they were finished eating by now he held out a hand to her as he got up. 

She took his hand and let him lead her over to the porch swing as she told him. “Yeah, that’s about it. And I get if that’s too much for you, but…”

“How did you come back? And why that moment?” he asked. 

“I…um…I don’t know if I should…”

“Please Audrey?”

“Why?” 

“Because if you know me then you know that I tend to rely on my instincts and my instincts are telling me that this is important,” he said, and her reaction to the question was only part of the reason. Mostly it was the way she tried to skip over the issue and the forced nonchalance when she mentioned when she came back.

“It’s a little much for a first date,” she warned. 

“Since when do I care about convention?” he chuckled. 

“Okay, so my original self was from another world which is how I created the troubles. Well, this world is more advanced than ours. When everything went to hell, my…mother for lack of a better word…who was a scientist over there, came to help find a way to stop it. We were working on creating a new barn to take them away again when the incident happened that destroyed the whole town.”

“You’re not going to distract me from the question by rambling,” he teased. 

“Can’t blame me for trying,” she shrugged sheepishly. “So like I said, they’re more advanced and they had this prototype device that was banned because of the time travel side effects. It was designed to help people find their…soulmates,” she bit her lip nervously. 

“Soulmate,” he breathed out in shock. “So…you came back to the moment we met because…”

“Because that was when the soulmate bond between us formed,” Audrey whispered. 

“You know…that doesn’t surprise me as much as you seem to think it would,” he said softly, reaching a hand to her cheek and turning her to look at him. 

“No?” 

“No,” she smiled, meeting her eyes. “You should know that I’m a loner. I don’t get attached to people, but you…” 

She couldn’t help but kiss him, despite knowing that it might be a mistake. He might still choose to walk away. Hell, he might even be more likely to walk away now that he had more of an idea of how deep he might fall, but god, he was kissing her back and it was perfect. 

Duke forced himself to pull back but didn’t go far. He rested his forehead against hers as he whispered, “I’m not walking away.” 

“I’m sorry,” she said sadly. “I hate that you’re going to end up hurting…”

“Some things are worth it,” he assured her before kissing her again. “Do you want to come back to the boat?” he asked breathlessly as they broke for air. 

“God, yes,” she breathed almost inaudibly as she followed him across the dock to where the Rouge was berthed. 

An hour later, Duke was holding her close as he caught his breath, and she was snuggled up to his side happily. After a little while of blissful silence, Duke got the courage to say, “So, I have a kinda insane question.”

“Shoot.” 

“Well…I know you’ve been living at the bed and breakfast, but…I mean…if we’ve only got a year and a half…I don’t want to waste a minute of it, so…” He let her fill in the blanks. 

“Are you asking me to move in with you?” she asked in shock. 

“I know it’s probably too soon, but…if you want…”

Audrey leaned up to kiss him softly before whispering, “Like you said. Don’t want to waste a minute.” That led to another round of lovemaking and they were basking in the afterglow again when Audrey considered, “You know I can’t really get out of cell phone range though right? I mean…I have to help with the troubles and all.”

“I know. I can keep her close to shore for a while,” Duke assured her. While he wasn’t going to let her work herself to death, now that he understood the situation, he knew that helping with the troubles was her main purpose here and why. She at least needed to be on call for them. 

“And if you do need to go out, I can always go back to the inn for a while. Don’t worry though. I have no interest in asking questions or digging for things I really shouldn’t know.”

“It really doesn’t bother you at all?” he asked the question that had been bugging him since the first time she’d stuck her neck out for him. 

“I know you, Duke. You don’t hurt people and do what you can to protect them. Anything else I can live with. As long as you don’t ask me to help.”

“I won’t,” he promised. 

“Then I’ll go get my stuff from the inn tomorrow,” she told him with a yawn. 

“Yeah. Tomorrow,” he smiled, leaning down for a lingering kiss. “Goodnight, Audrey.”

“Night Duke,” she murmured sleepily and was out moments later. Duke lay awake for quite a while, turning everything over in his head and ending up with a hundred more questions, but they could wait. They’d gotten the most important part handled and when he did eventually fall asleep it was with a smile as he leaned his cheek against Audrey’s hair. 

Audrey woke to the smell of food the next morning and grinned as she stretched out in the bed. She got up and pulled one of Duke’s longer shirts on, buttoned it up halfway, and then headed for the galley. As she came in Duke handed her a cup of coffee and said, “Breakfast will be ready in about five minutes.”

“Mmm. You have no idea how much I’ve missed your breakfasts,” she said happily. 

“I had a habit of making you breakfast in the future?” he asked with a raised eyebrow. Normally breakfast came after a night like last night, but she’d said they weren’t together then. 

“I don’t know if I’d say a /habit/ per se. I mean, you were generally knocking on my door with morning coffee at least a couple times a week, but you only made breakfast when you could tell I hadn’t been eating well,” she told him. 

“And how long had it been in the future since I’d done that?” 

“About two years,” she told him sadly. First he was dealing with his trouble ripping him apart and Mara had been her and then his trouble bomb went off and he skipped town. Then he came back all black eyed and crazy right before the town blew up.

“I guess that explains why you actually ate the day we met,” he chuckled. He set a plate in front of her as he sat down with his own plate. “As I’m sure you know, I enjoy cooking, so you can expect this often,” he tried to cheer her up. Once they were eating, he asked about another question that had popped into his head last night. “So everything that’s happened since you came back. Did you know it was going to happen and just let it? Or did changes you made snowball?” 

“Yes and no,” she gave a half shrug. “See the incident where the barn was destroyed and I was trapped inside for over six months? I’d already been in the process of having my memories and personality rewritten and when I managed to get out as it was falling apart around me, my memories got scrambled and I ended up with two sets of memories. It took a while for me to get myself together and I still remember most of the big stuff, but the details…especially the early details like now…tend to escape me. I…I’m so sorry about Jeff.” She knew exactly why he was asking. 

“But you tried,” he half-asked. 

“I really did,” she told him. “It was just…I remembered he died. And the trouble going on at the time, so I handled the trouble early. Last time we hadn’t figured that out until later. When the grand opening still went to hell, I made sure that he didn’t eat anything and then thought we were in the clear. I forgot that he’d been killed by the sous chef who just made it /look/ like the trouble. I feel horrible about it.”

Duke reached over and took her hand, caressing it lovingly. “It’s okay, Audrey. You tried. It wasn’t your fault you didn’t remember that part. If you had, you would have saved him.” 

“I did intentionally let Nathan come after you while he was crazy,” she admitted with a chuckle. She did feel bad about it, but it was also kinda funny. 

“Why?” Duke asked with an amused glint in his eyes. 

“A few reasons. For one thing, I needed you to learn about the troubles and getting dragged into that case was what let you do that. Also…in the future, you and Nathan are best friends again. And what happened that day was a big part of that.” 

“That makes sense. And it didn’t hurt /too/ bad so I guess I forgive you,” he joked. “So is there anything I should know about the future? Stock prices, sports scores…”

Audrey laughed and shook her head. “Nothing like that, but there is something that you should know.” She hesitated a minute before getting up and taking the dishes to the sink to be washed later and then taking his hand and leading him to the couch so they could be more comfortable. 

“I’m thinking I’m not going to like this,” Duke said nervously. 

“You’re not,” Audrey sighed. “But you need to know.” When Duke nodded, she told him. “Your family has a trouble too.”

“And it’s a bad one?” he asked worriedly. 

“It /can/ be very bad. But it also has its uses, and you kept it under control.”

“What kind of uses?”

“When a Crocker kills a troubled person, it kills their trouble. For the entire family, living and yet to be born,” Audrey told him. “But it comes at a price. See, whenever you come into contact with troubled blood, it kind of…transforms you. Your eyes glow all silver and you get super strength, but most importantly, you get a rush. You said that it felt incredible. Pure heaven, you called it once. But it also comes with an almost uncontrollable bloodlust.”

“But I controlled it?” Duke asked hopefully. 

“For the most part,” Audrey told him. “Some people got hurt at first, but you didn’t kill anyone because of it and both you and everyone else quickly learned that when you got blood on you to step back and give you some space to bring it under control and most importantly, not to touch you. There was even once that you intentionally activated it to save someone who was trapped in a sinking car because you needed the super-strength to pull the car apart enough to get her out and managed to bring her all the way back to shore and up the cliff without even once giving in and hurting her.” 

“That’s good,” Duke sighed relieved. “I can see what you mean by coming in handy. But I’d still rather avoid it if possible…is it possible to avoid it?” 

“Possibly,” Audrey told him. “And if that’s what you want to do, I’ll back you.” She had learned her lesson about trying to make his decisions for him. “But there is a situation where it would save a lot of lives.”

“What kind of situation?” 

“There is a trouble that causes a person’s organs to shut down and they have this…thing that comes out of their mouth to harvest organs from family members. Well the guy who started the whole thing worked at a fertility clinic and had hundreds of kids out there and he was killing them left and right, but every time we managed to stop him and interrupt him, the kid that he’d been about to kill got their curse activated too. By the time we finally caught him, there were four kids out there continuing the cycle and either dying of organ failure or killing their family members,” she explained. 

“And you can’t just stop it from happening?” Duke asked hopefully. 

“I’m going to try,” she promised. “But it’s complicated. He travels a lot and from what I could tell last time, he wasn’t anywhere near Haven when his curse activated. I could try checking the records at the fertility clinics and see if a name jogs a memory, but I can’t even remember exactly when he worked there or what clinic he worked at. I know that it wasn’t in Haven, but it was in a nearby town. I just can’t remember which one. Then, if I can figure out who it is, I have to figure out /where/ he is, and /when/ I need to get to him. But even if I do manage to stop him…there’s still a lot of other people out there that could be activated for any number of other reasons…” 

“Yeah. I see what you mean by complicated,” Duke sighed as he considered the matter. 

“Last time around…he was already dying of organ failure when I begged you to kill him, and it still wrecked you. You saved so many lives, but the one you took still tore you apart and…and I can’t ask you to do that again. To go through that again. No matter how many lives it costs.”

“So you’re not asking and leaving it up to me,” Duke nodded in understanding. “How long do we have?” 

“About a year, give or take. I know it was the end of summer, but not this summer,” she told him. 

Duke took a few deep breaths as he decided. “Okay, so we try to avoid activating my trouble, but if it comes down to it…if you can’t stop it before it starts…I’ll do what I need to do. But that is the /only/ kind of situation I will ever use it for.” 

“And I would never ask you to use it for anything else,” she vowed. 

“So I didn’t…in the future?” he asked to confirm. 

“Before the barn, no. That was the only time you used it. I’m not counting the time you were basically kidnapped and someone put a knife in your hand and stabbed themselves with it. Which I will absolutely be doing whatever I can to prevent this time.”

“Before the barn. But after…” Duke realized what she was implying. 

“After…when things really went to hell…there was another similar situation. A two-month-old baby was killing half a dozen people every time it cried…”

“I would never…I don’t care how many people were dying…I couldn’t…” Duke stammered almost frantically. 

“No, no, no,” she assured him, rubbing her hands over his shoulders. “No, you didn’t hurt the baby. Like you said, you /couldn’t/. No, the baby’s father asked you to kill him to save not just the baby, but the rest of their rather large family.”

“Oh. Okay,” Duke sighed in relief. “I mean, I still hate it, but…at least he volunteered. And it wasn’t a baby.” 

“Yeah, that was pretty much your reaction then too,” Audrey smiled. 

“And that was it? Just the two?” 

“That was it until you…I mean…that was all /you/ did,” she lied. She absolutely was /not/ telling him about Wade. Period. 

“That thing that happened to me that you don’t want to talk about?” he asked. When she nodded, he was getting the feeling that something made him not himself anymore and he could live with not knowing most of it, but there was one thing he had to know. “Did I hurt you?” 

“No,” she shook her head. “Even the thing that took you over could never have hurt me. The bond between us was too strong. In fact, it almost saved you at one point. If I’d just had a few more minutes…you were fighting back. I could see it. I almost had you back. But then…”

“Then what?” Duke coaxed gently. 

“Then the thing’s boss came in and jolted you out of it. I didn’t see you again after that until…until the explosion and we found your body. I think…it intentionally kept you away from me,” she said hauntedly, both at the memory of when he’d kidnapped her and taken her to Croatoan and the sight of his mangled and broken body laying in the rubble. 

Duke pulled her close to his side, setting aside his own feelings to soothe hers. “It’s okay,” he whispered, pressing a kiss to her head. “It’s not gonna happen this time remember? We won’t let it. No matter what.” 

Audrey nodded against his chest, relaxing in his arms as the memories faded back to the recesses of her mind. “No. We won’t. No matter what,” she agreed. 

Once he could see that she’d recovered from that, he just had one more question. Hopefully an easier one. “You said that someone destroyed the barn to stop you from going…it wasn’t me was it?” 

“No,” she shook her head and looked up at him with a loving smile. “No, you respected my decision, no matter how much you hated it. You would have taken me away in a second if I’d let you, but you didn’t try to force the matter.” 

Duke nodded relieved. “And I’ll respect your decision this time too. And I will most definitely hate it.”

“I know,” she smiled sadly and leaned up to kiss him softly. “If there’s one person in this world that I can trust, it’s you.” 

Duke cradled her cheek and neck as he said wryly, “You know…That’s the first time anyone’s ever said that to me.” 

Audrey chuckled. “I can imagine. You don’t let many people close enough to let them trust you.” She knew that it was as much his fault as anyone’s the way people saw him. Sure, no one bothered to look past the surface, but he never really gave them much chance to either. “I love you, Duke,” slipped from her lips. “I mean, I know you’re not there yet and that’s okay. You don’t have to…to say anything or reciprocate or anything, I just…I never got the chance to say it in the future and just needed…”

Duke leaned down and captured her lips to cut off the rambling, kissing her slow and deep before pulling back. “I know,” he whispered. He’d known from the way she talked that she loved him. And she was right that he wasn’t there yet, but he had no doubt that he would be. Probably soon. He got that she needed him to know after holding it in for so long in that future world. 

Audrey snuggled up against his side for a good while in comfortable silence before saying, “I guess I’ll go get my stuff now…as long as you haven’t changed your mind?”

“Not a chance,” he grinned, giving her another short kiss. “You want some help?”

“Nah. I don’t have much,” she told him. 

“Then I’ll be here making room,” he decided.


	5. Chapter 5

On Monday morning, Audrey went into the station, knowing that it was time to tell Nathan about the future. She also needed to update Garland on some things along with her address, so she asked Nathan to meet her in the chief’s office. “What is it, Parker?” Garland asked her, seeing the same question shining in his son’s face. 

“A few things. First I’m going to tell Nathan about the future and I thought you might want to chime in,” she told him. 

“You sure he’s ready for that?” Garland asked. 

“He’s as ready as he’s ever going to be.”

“You can stop talking about me like I’m not here,” Nathan snapped leveling a glare on his father. “And what happened to no more secrets? Like you haven’t already kept enough from me.”

That answered Audrey’s question of whether or not he’d been told about his biological father. That was the only secret Garland held that could contain that much rancor. Garland was the one to answer though. “This one wasn’t my secret to tell.”

“It was mine,” Audrey told him, motioning him to sit. “This is going to be hard to believe, which is why I wanted to give you a chance to process what I already told you first. I’m from the future.”

“Right,” Nathan scoffed. 

“She is. I’ve confirmed it with sources that I trust and some of the things she knows, there is no other way she could have known them,” Garland told him. 

Nathan looked thoughtful for a few minutes before asking, “That’s how you know about the troubles and that barn thing and that you’ll be leaving and everything?” 

“Yeah. I didn’t find out last time around until the last minute. I decided to go, but then someone tried to prevent me leaving and shot Agent Howard, who is kind of the keeper of the barn and the whole thing imploded with me inside. Since time works differently for the barn, it took over six months for the implosion to finish while I was trapped in there. Once I got out, the troubles had gotten completely out of hand and the next over three years was spent just trying to hold things together and failing more than succeeding. When the entire town was blown off the map thanks to a group of troubles colliding, I came back to fix it.”

“I hope you’ve handled the situation with someone interfering with the barn,” Garland asked as much as said. 

“It’s handled,” she told him. 

“Who was it?” Nathan asked, planning to make sure. 

“It doesn’t matter who it was,” Audrey shook her head and said again, “It’s handled.”

“I’m going to have to go with Nathan here. This is too important not to be sure,” Garland said seriously. 

“You don’t trust me when I say that it’s handled?” she asked irritated and a little hurt.

“Like the chief said. It’s too important not to have a few more eyes on it,” Nathan agreed. 

Audrey rolled her eyes. “Fine. If you want to know so badly, it was you Nathan.”

“What?!” two voices snapped. 

“When you found out that you could feel my touch since I’m immune to the troubles, you convinced yourself you were in love with me and tried to keep me here. Said we could find another way to end the troubles. Duke tried to stop you, but the guard were shooting at you too and saving your life distracted him from stopping you from interfering.”

“Duke,” Nathan scoffed. “Great. I owed my life to Duke freaking Crocker.”

“Which brings me to another piece of news. I need to update my address,” she told them, knowing that it would turn into a discussion about Duke in general and the Crocker family curse specifically. 

“To where?” Garland asked already pulling out a piece of paper to write it down and update their records. 

“The Cape Rouge. But you can use the Grey Gull as the mailing address,” she smirked. 

“The Cape Rouge. Duke’s boat. Please tell me he just offered you a spare room or something?” Nathan asked desperately. 

“Can’t do that,” she shrugged. 

“So this time he’s gonna be the one trying to stop you from going?” Nathan asked incredulously. 

“No. He wouldn’t. He was in love with me last time too and let me go. He respected my decision and wanted this town saved just as much as I did. And he will respect my decision this time too.”

“He knows then?” Garland asked suspiciously. 

“He knows everything,” she told him. “I wasn’t going to let him get involved with me without knowing that there was an expiration date.”

“How can you trust him?” Nathan asked disbelievingly. 

“Because I know him,” she said firmly. “Which is something that he doesn’t allow many people to do,” she pointed out. “He plays the selfish, devil-may-care, criminal act to a tee, but there’s a lot more to him than that and he doesn’t have a selfish bone in his body.”

“I don’t think we’re talking about the same Duke,” Nathan huffed. 

“You saw it too,” Audrey told him. “You two got over whatever silly fight you’re in now and became best friends again. He was right there beside us fighting tooth and nail for this town for years. He’d saved both of our lives a dozen times over and never asked for a thing in return. The three of us were a team in so many ways. He just wanted to help people.”

“I’ve seen how Crockers ‘help’,” Garland sneered. He’d been observing and filing information away for later, but he had to jump in there. “You have to know about the Crocker curse.”

“I do, and I also know that Duke is different from the other Crockers. I watched him fight the curse for years,” she told him. “He never fell to it the way the other Crockers did. Before the barn incident, he killed one person. When there was no other choice. After I begged him to do it. The man was already dying anyway and his trouble was so awful that hundreds of people or more would have died if the trouble didn’t die with him. Even then, Duke drowned himself in booze for days and hated me for asking him to do it.” 

Garland tilted his head in thought as he scrutinized her trying to read the truth. “Simon was once a friend of mine. I watched him fall to this curse. Claim that he was ‘helping’ people by killing them. I saw what it did to him. The high, the bloodlust…”

“Duke is the strongest person I’ve ever known,” Audrey told him. “And the most stubborn. He won’t let anyone or anything control him. He chose his own destiny and screw anyone who stood in his way,” she said with a mix of love and pride.

“Which is why he respected your choice with barn. Letting you choose your own destiny too,” Garland nodded in understanding, get a nod in return from Audrey. “I’ll go easy on him then. But don’t think I’m gonna turn by back on his illegal activities,” he added the last part in warning. 

Audrey laughed, “I would never ask it of you. And neither will he. I think the challenge of evading the law is his favorite part.” 

“Is anyone going to fill me in on this Crocker trouble?” Nathan asked impatiently. 

“Basically, whenever a Crocker kills a troubled person, it cures the trouble from their whole family. Even the ones that already have it. The guy he killed had already inadvertently activated his same trouble in four of his kids, including a ten-year-old boy. When Duke was the one to finish him off, all four of those kids were cured. And it was just in time because the ten year old was just about to kill his seven year old sister when it happened,” she told him. 

“The organ stealing trouble,” Garland figured out, getting a nod from Audrey. “That one didn’t crop up until the very end last time. It was the only time I actually wished that Simon was still alive.” 

“Wait, you said that he only killed one /before/ the barn. What about after?” Nathan asked, trying to find something to prove himself right and get back on level ground again. 

“He killed one after that too,” Audrey sighed sadly. “It was another no choice situation. Like I said, the troubles were getting out of hand and the Harker family curse was activated in a two month old baby.” She could see by the widening of Garland’s eyes that he was familiar with the Harker family curse, but she still explained for Nathan. “Any time the baby cried, half a dozen people all over town would drop dead. The baby’s father /asked/ Duke to kill him. He volunteered. And even then Duke only agreed when we couldn’t find another way.” She had no intention of telling either of them about the whole Croatoan mess and the thing that Duke became under his control. It would never happen and it didn’t matter. She just wanted to ease some of the pressure on Duke in the meantime and get them to see that he wasn’t a bad guy. 

“Also understandable,” Garland nodded in acceptance. “As long as he sticks to those kinds of issues, we won’t have a problem.”

“We’re going to be trying not to activate his trouble at all,” Audrey told him. “But when I told him about the organ stealing one, he agreed that if we couldn’t stop it, then he reluctantly would.”

Garland wasn’t sure how he wanted to play that one. Stopping the trouble now and preventing Duke from having to kill it would just mean it would come back again in the next cycle and who knew if there would be a Crocker then /to/ handle it. He wasn’t going to say anything right now though. He would see how it played out. “Fair enough.”

“So you and Duke were together in the future then too?” Nathan asked. 

“No. Everything was complicated then,” Audrey shook her head and then changed the subject. “As far as cases coming up, I’m not sure exactly when or in what order they happen, but lately my memory has been easier to jog once they start.” 

“That’s how you figured out Beaty’s problem so quickly,” Nathan realized. “And Bill’s.”

“Yeah, I’ve been doing what I can to minimize the damage, but one thing I can tell you is that old Mr. Carpenter on Carpenter’s Knot is a chameleon,” she told them. “He doesn’t want to hurt anyone, and Lucy helped him take over the life of someone who was brain dead which is how he became Mr. Carpenter. Unfortunately, his body is starting to break down now after so long and he needs a new one.” She looked seriously at Garland. “I know you’ve had bad experiences with chameleons before, but this one isn’t like that. He needs help, not death.” 

“Spoken just like Lucy,” Garland huffed. “I’ll do some digging and see who I can find. Any idea of a time frame?” 

“By the beginning of December,” she told him. 

“You remember that date pretty clearly,” Nathan half asked. 

“He invited us out there for my birthday party so that he could ask me for help, but I was still too new. I didn’t know how to help him then and it turned into a disaster.” 

“I’ll look into it,” Garland promised. “Anything else you can tell us with a reasonable time frame?” 

“Not off the top of my head no,” she shook her head. 

“Okay. Then get back to work. I’m not paying you to sit around and chat.” 

It took a couple months for Garland to find someone to house the Chameleon. A young man who’d been in a car accident and was brain dead. The only family he had was an elderly mother who was refusing to pull the plug. He took Audrey with him to both talk to Mr. Carpenter and a nurse at the hospital who had to move all of the monitoring equipment. In that time, Nathan and Audrey had gotten closer, but both been careful to keep it to a level of friends. Nathan couldn’t imagine ever feeling strongly enough to put one person over the entire town that he’d sworn to protect, but he had no intention of putting himself in a position where that would be a tempting decision again. Nathan had also lightened up about Duke and they’d become something like friends again too. Duke and Audrey settled into a life together seamlessly and it didn’t take long before Duke was tossing out those three little words too. 

For the cases, Audrey generally remembered enough to put them on the right track as soon as the first incident happened. She didn’t usually remember exactly who, but enough of the why that they were able to narrow it down relatively quickly. Unfortunately, even her warning hadn’t been enough to save Garland’s life. The arrival of Max Hansen still upset him enough to make him shatter. At least he and Nathan had managed to put things behind him and had as good a relationship as they ever had, not that it was saying much. 

With Audrey not trying to use FBI resources, it never drew the attention of the real Audrey Parker so that situation was avoided, but Audrey had forgotten about Evi which meant that Duke didn’t get any warning before she showed up. Once she did though, Audrey told him about Evi working with the rev, supposedly in an effort to help Duke, and how it got her killed. That made Duke even more determined to get her out of town by any means necessary, and thanks to his relationship with Audrey he even succeeded. Between the realization that she wasn’t getting Duke back and her nervousness about being around a cop, she wasn’t that eager to stay. Not that she didn’t try and fail to split Duke and Audrey up first. 

Audrey still ended up having to kill the rev, but this time she did try to shoot him in the leg first. He didn’t stop trying to kill the girl though, so she did what she had to do, despite the mess it would cause. When she was kidnapped by Arla, all the knowledge she had now, including who she was and why she was doing this, managed to knock her off balance enough to make a mistake. She hadn’t been able to remember exactly when the kidnapping happened, but she had remembered enough about where she was to make it easy for Duke and Nathan to find her quickly and Arla was no longer an issue. 

Unfortunately, she hadn’t been able to stop the organ harvester, and Duke reluctantly did what he had to do, Nathan donating the blood to get him activated. Just like last time, he managed to fight the effects, and even better with Audrey’s help, though she did spend a few nights holding him as he fought off the guilt from killing a defenseless person. Nathan was glad that he didn’t end up having to manipulate things to get them there like his father had told him to. Garland had really wanted that trouble taken off the board for good. 

Finally, the time came for Audrey to leave. Duke had been taking pictures for a little while and even gotten Nathan to take some of them so that he would have them to remember her by and they had both been clinging just a little tighter for the last few months. Duke insisted on going out to Kick ‘Em Jenny Neck with her to see her off, but Vince ended up coming along too thanks to a compromise with the guard. They wanted to make sure she went into the barn and Vince wanted to make sure that Duke didn’t interfere. 

Audrey waited until the morning after the meteor storm started, knowing that there was time and wanting one last night with Duke. Once they got there, she found Howard waiting for her. The first time she had seen him since she’d given him the message. He hadn’t had any need to push her into the positions she needed to be in, so he had been keeping his distance as he was supposed to do. “You’re right on time,” he told her. “I assume you’re ready to go?” 

“Just give me a few minutes to say my goodbyes,” she told him and he nodded and stepped aside to wait for her. Audrey turned to Vince first and gave him a hug. “You’ve been a good friend to me, Vince. Both this time and the last. I would say I’ll miss you, but…”

Vince chuckled despite the tears shining in his eyes as he hugged her back. “I keep thinking this is going to get easier.”

“Losing someone you care about is never easy,” she said sadly and kissed his cheek before moving to Duke. She kissed him deeply and then rested their foreheads together. “I’m sorry I won’t remember you when I get back,” she said as the first few tears leaked from her eyes. 

“Hey, maybe I’ll get lucky and your new personality will have a thing for older men,” he tried to lighten the mood pulling a laugh from her as her tears started to flow heavier. Duke wiped them away with his thumbs as he told her, “It’s okay, Audrey. I’ll remember for the both of us. Always.”

“Do you regret it?” she all but whispered as she ran her fingers through his hair. 

“Not a second,” he said softly. “Loving you has been and will always be the best part of my life.”

“You’ll be okay, right? You’ll pick yourself up and move on?” she practically begged. 

“You know me. I always land on my feet,” Duke told her with a wry smile.

She noticed that he didn’t promise to move on, but she hadn’t really expected him too. She hoped that someday someone else would come along and manage to get through his walls to make him happy. Maybe even Jennifer. She’d told him about her and how to find her, but wasn’t holding out much hope. Duke /wanted/ to be alone more often than not. “Always remember how much I love you,” she sniffled. 

“Always,” Duke whispered his promise. “And know that I love you with everything I am and that will never change as long as I live.”

“I know,” she told him, giving him one more long loving kiss. “Goodbye, Duke,” she whispered before turning to walk away. 

“Goodbye, Audrey,” he whispered too softly for her to hear it as he watched her walk away. 

Vince heard him though as he came over and put a comforting hand on Duke’s shoulder. He was relatively certain now that he wouldn’t need to intervene and marveled at Duke’s strength and resolve. Audrey had told him that there was nothing to worry about, but he hadn’t quite believed her and the two of them watched in silence as she stepped inside the barn which then disappeared. Vince waited another moment before giving Duke’s shoulder a squeeze and walking away. Giving him some time alone that he clearly wanted. 

Vince had long taken his boat and left before Duke made it back to the Cape Rouge and took her back to the mainland…and then spent the next three days in the bottle before picking himself back up and getting back to work. 

Audrey had no idea how long she had /actually/ been in the barn, but it only felt like minutes before she had a visitor. “Mom,” she breathed out. “I mean…sorry. Charlotte,” she corrected herself with a wince. 

“Mom is fine,” Charlotte told her. “The files that my future self sent included a video diary of sorts. I know everything that happened and why she made the decision she did to erase Mara and implant you as the primary. She still considered you her daughter and so do I.” 

“Thank you,” Audrey smiled and leaned into the offered hug. “I wasn’t expecting to see you though…”

“I have been working with her research, trying to refine it and figure out how to modify this barn to do what she wanted. With Mara gone, you no longer deserve to be here. You’ve earned your freedom.”

“And…you did it? Figured out how to modify it?” Audrey asked hopefully. “It can take the troubles away for good and I don’t have to stay?” 

“Yes, I did,” Charlotte told her with a smile. “It took a little longer to figure out how to do so while still saving James inside, but he will be able to live a long and happy life in here.” 

“Thank you,” Audrey said relieved. Knowing that her son had died with the barn in the last timeline had been hard to deal with. 

“You have a few choices, now,” Charlotte explained. “You can come home to our world where you will be welcomed with open arms. You can return to Earth as Audrey Parker, or you can return to Earth with a new life and memories and start over.”

“How long will have passed there?” Audrey asked. 

“Just under five years,” Charlotte told her. 

“I’ll go back as Audrey Parker then,” she agreed. Duke would still be there, and maybe even still available. Maybe they could get back together. 

“I expected you to choose that,” Charlotte said with a knowing smile. “Knowing how you came back in time, I assumed you would want your soulmate back. Here,” she handed her a ring that she hadn’t yet come across in this time. “In case you ever decide to return home.” 

Audrey took it gratefully and slid it onto her right hand. “Thank you. But…would it be possible to make me mortal?” she remembered with that statement that she was currently immortal. 

“It is…but once done it could never be reversed,” Charlotte said worriedly. 

“Will you? Please?” 

“You want to grow old and die?” 

“Yes. I do. I want to live my life with Duke and be able to grow old with him,” Audrey told her. 

“It is possible for him to become immortal with you. You can link his life force to yours instead,” Charlotte told her hopefully. 

“I…um…does a decision have to be made now?” 

“No. It doesn’t. You and he can discuss it and just use the ring to call for me once you’ve decided and I can make it happen.” She desperately hoped that her daughter wouldn’t choose death and even if it meant sneaking a human into their world to complete the process, she would do it. Perhaps someday they could even be welcomed there. Not that she was going to get Audrey’s hopes up for that. 

“Okay. Then we’ll figure it out soon enough,” Audrey gave a relieved sigh, glad that she wasn’t being asked to make the decision for him too. Especially without even knowing if he had moved on from her or not. 

“Are you ready to return then?” Charlotte asked, getting a nod in return and then Audrey found herself standing at the lighthouse on the point. 

Audrey walked back to the main road and flagged down a ride to the Grey Gull. If Duke was in town at all, that would be the best place to find him. She walked in the door and immediately saw him tending the bar and a smile broke out on her face as she moved aside and stood there watching him for a bit. He looked good. A little more of the grey around his temples, but otherwise normal. It didn’t take long before he noticed her and his eyes widened and she could see his breath catch all the way from here. She saw him reach out and tap the other bartender and say something without taking his eyes off her and then he was walking over. She could see the question shining like hope in his eyes as he approached and once he was close enough to hear her she said, “It’s still me, Duke.”

Hearing her words, the breath that he’d been holding since he saw her came out in a rush and he closed the last distance between them in two strides, sweeping her up in a passionate kiss. Neither of them cared about the number of eyes on them and they didn’t separate until she needed air and even then they didn’t go far. “How is this possible? Does this mean the troubles are back early? Are you…”

Audrey cut him off with a laugh. “We had been working on another way in the future and it finally got figured out. I’m free. For good. And the troubles will never come back.”

Duke kissed her again before picking her up and carrying her out the door, headed for the Rouge that was docked outside. She barely had time to notice that all her stuff was still there where she left it and the framed picture of them on the nightstand before she was in the bed and any thought but Duke became superfluous. She was finally home, and she was never leaving again.


End file.
